Patent Cliffs
Patent cliffs are those patents that are nearing its protection period granted by their respective authorities. It has recently garnered much interest due to the importance of a few well known patents in the pharmaceutical industry that is coming to its end as a protected drug. A good example will be the drugs produced by Pfizer called Lipitor and Viagra. Its patent will expire in 2011 and 2012, and of great concern to Pfizer is that Lipitor contributes almost 25% of the company’s revenue. Together with Viagra and a few other drugs, Pfizer’s revenue will nosedive steeply if the protection vanishes in a steep curve. It is desperately seeking other items to offset the lost in revenue once protection is taken away. But for now, the patent cliff seems insurmountable and facing the shareholders will be an unpleasant affair.
Pfizer is not alone in this situation as others like Merck and Co, Astra Zeneca Plc, Johnson &Johnson and Abbot Laboratories are facing the same problem. It is generally believed that dugs amounting to $70 over billion from ten of the largest pharmaceutical firms will face generic competition in the next couple of years from 2010 onwards. Much of these competitions will come from low cost manufacturing countries like India, China and Brazil. Drugs like Seroquel from AstraZeneca, Cozaa and Singulair from Merck will face the patent cliff in another two to three years. What then can be done? With the financial crisis going on for the next couple of years, there is not much money going into R & D to quicken the availability of new powerful drugs, such that pharmaceutical firms will have to explore other areas to bring in revenue.
VoloMedia is now synonymous with podcasting? You bet!
VoloMedia, an almost unheard of entity has now being granted with a patent for “method of providing episodic media content” by the USPTO (US patent office). In its own word to the public, they are now the owner of the “podcasting” technology. The patent was filed in 2003, a year before the term “podcasting” was used by internet users. Podcasting is the technique in which audio contents are downloaded to users for used at their own time on anything that resembles a memory drive. And it is usually free. But now, it looks like VoloMedia will exact payment for the commercial use of its so claimed technology. There is no doubt plenty of protest as to whether VoloMedia is the legitimate inventor of the system, and there will surely be many parties challenging its claim by seeking to invalidate it.
If VoloMedia succeeds in enforcing its podcasting patent, which is likely, then the ramifications to the podcasting industry is dire, to say the least. For those who had enjoyed doing podcasting, and also those who use podcasting contents, it is likely that they will have to cease their activities, unless they are willing to pay up. However, this patent is only granted in the United States, and it is not likely that a similar patent will be granted in any other country, it becomes impossible to enforce when the contents are broadcasted from a foreign based server. So, all is not lost for podcasting aficionados yet, and it is still early days before the whole episode is played out.
July 31, 2009.
Which Japanese company is most prolific in patents?
Japan, being the second largest economy (will be taken over by China by 2010) in the world is a technology powerhouse. But which company is the foremost filer of good patents? According to Patent Result, a Tokyo based research firm, Panasonic filed the most patents. In evaluating the types and strengths of patents of Japanese firms, the research firm had compiled a list of companies ranked accordingly to various factors like the duration of the patents held and whether there are objections from other competing companies. At second spot is Toshiba, followed by Canon and Hitachi. The top seven firms are involved in the electronics sector and only Toyota, which is ranked eight, is in the non-electronic sector.
October 15, 2009.
The Nortel backlash
Nortel, which is under liquidation is believed to have a chestful of patents for sale. We are talking about 6,000 patents, some of them are related to key industries including wireless video, Wi-Fi, Internet search, social networking and even the new generation of wireless technology known as LTE. Just to show how important these patents are, the big boys like Apple, Google, Research in Motion and Microsoft is eagerly waiting to snap them up. Also showing concern is the US Justice Department and the reason is that they are worried that the big boys might buy it to unfairly hobble competition. There is a general view that patents are now being used to stifle competition and no where is more visible than the string of law suites brought by patent trolls against new start-ups. For a start, the Justice Department's antitrust division is looking at Google's $900 million opening bid for the Nortel patents. The small guys are equally worried as well because they might become the real victim as some of their technologies would have infringed on the patents that are the subject of the auction.
June 5, 2011